ECCVAT publishes recommendations on new VAT rules proposed by European Commission
The European Charities’ Committee on Value-Added Tax (ECCVAT) has published its recommendations for changes to the VAT rules proposed by the European Commission earlier this year.
On 18 January 2018, the European Commission proposed new rules amending the VAT Directive (2006/112/EC) to give Member States more flexibility when setting VAT rates. Following discussions with the Commission, the EESC and MEPs, ECCVAT suggested some changes to improve the Commission’s proposal which have been recently published.
ECCVAT Chair, Hanna Surmatz, from the European Foundation Centre (EFC), and deputy-chair, Max von Abendroth from DAFNE, issued a joint statement stating that:
“the irrevocable VAT is a significant financial burden on public benefit organisations, which are often treated as the final consumer and we hope that the current VAT reform will be able to take the specific issues of charities into account!”
The statement calls for:
- Recognising the specific position of charities to ensure they receive the benefit of reduced rates and zero rates
- Allowing the deduction of input VAT of non-taxable services and deliveries provided by charities
- Protecting current derogations and reduced rates and making them available to charities and other public benefit organisations across Europe
- Introducing more regular reviews of the list of the excluded items
The statement can be found in full below. For any further information please contact Hanna Surmatz.